Chapters (67)
- Cover
- Dedication
- PROLOGUE
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- PART TWO
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- PART THREE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- PART FOUR
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- EPILOGUE
- Mailing list
- A Letter from Kathryn
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- Also by Kathryn Croft
Sienna doesn’t blame him for this. Some people are too afraid of the truth; living in denial is safer. ‘Rob, I need to tell you something. I know I should have said something before, but I… I just wanted to speak to Greg first.’
He shakes his head. ‘Don’t,’ he says, holding up his hand. ‘Whatever you’re going to say, please don’t.’
‘You already know, don’t you?’
He stares across the lawn to the house. Sienna imagines he’s picturing that night, how comfortable they all were, how content. She thinks he nods, but she can’t be sure.
‘They slept together, Rob.’ She throws it out there. After all, this is their burden to share together; Sienna should never have kept it from him just so she’d have something to hold over Abby. She should have put Rob first.
He doesn’t say anything, but she notices his hands are curled into fists.
‘I have to go,’ he says.
Sienna stares after him, calls his name several times, but he doesn’t turn around.
She needs to let him go for now. What’s done is done.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Abby
She doesn’t know where Rob is and has barely heard from him all day. Although they spent the whole weekend at home together, no meaningful words passed between them. There was no hostility, just a mound of excuses on Rob’s part to be in any room other than the one she was in.
Then this afternoon a text from him came, telling her that Greg didn’t turn up for work. She’d immediately called him, needing more than just written words, wanting to hear a voice telling it to her. It didn’t change anything, though. Greg is missing and the chance of him having deliberately walked out is minuscule.
Her hands shook so much when Rob filled her in that she had to make excuses to get off the phone. And even when her legs threatened to give way beneath her, she couldn’t bring herself to sit down. The problem is she knows too much, but it’s all trapped in her head, locked up. She cannot say a word.
Rob came home after work before heading straight out again. ‘Meeting a friend,’ he’d said, closing the door before she’d had a chance to ask who.
Now she’s sitting on the sofa with her laptop, looking through job vacancies. At least she can try to sort out one issue in her life while all the others pile up around her. They will bury her eventually.
She’s typing an application letter when she hears his key turn in the lock. The school is on the other side of London, but she’s going for it anyway – a long commute is the least of her worries.
‘You’re still up,’ he says. ‘I thought you’d be in bed by now.’